Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Punisher #7 seems to be a mixed bag for me. It is a welcome change of pace to this young series that sees Castle journey south of the border to find refuge and to get as far away from Los Angeles as possible. It sees him go from being captured to being tortured to then being sold off to an old-school villain by the name of Crossbones.

Edmondson delivers a solid entry for the series by including plenty of action elements, a new villain and by having Frank get back into an old-school environment...the jungle. These elements help the story to overcome some questionable story line choices such as Frank once again getting captured and he even needs the help of a POW to get out alive. Then there are the too frequently inserted acronyms used throughout the book that have to be explained to the reader as to what exactly is being communicated. It makes sense for that to be used maybe once but there were at least four to five times it happened in the book. I truly think that Edmondson has a long-term plot that helps tie all of this together but at this point it just seems a little too discombobulated. Hopefully this will change over the course of the next few issues.

The art on this particular issue I felt suffered a bit. Mitch Gerads steps back from doing the pencils in this issue but he still shines in cover art. Carmen Carnero steps in to do the work in this issue and even though there are things that people have taken issue with Gerads work it is still clear that he has improved significantly during his time on this title and that this issue suffered due to him being away. Hopefully he will be back soon.

In conclusion, I really liked certain parts of this issue but it still frustrates me that the title is still missing a special something. Edmondson started this book by painting Castle as a mysterious vigilante who few people can recognize in person who can be extremely tactical to know being a character that is extremely vulnerable and is a step behind on everything. It just doesn't seem to add up is all. I really hope that the title steadily improves over the course of the next few issues or this book could see an end unfortunately sooner rather than later.

Thursday, June 12, 2014

Glad that we will have only two weeks between last issue and this one. This time Kevin Maurer and Nathan Edmondson will be the writers for the upcoming 2 part arc. In the artwork it's time for Carmen Carnero and i was pretty impressed by her work. The cover was done by Mitch Gerads with his sharpest artwork as always.

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

You probably might think why am i doing this review since this blog is Punisher related but i like to imagine that in the plush kingdom the Punisher has some sort of "representative" and his name is Mega Bear!

This is part1 of this animated series called the Mega Plush. Who is the Mega Plush? They are a group of vigilantes who fights SOC army and his evil leader to takeover the plush kingdom. The story seems quite simple but the animation is one of the best i've seen in years. This series has everything to be a success and due to a fact that any character speaks any language it makes this acessible to everyone in this world.

About this episode, Mega Bear is amazing and... cute. Bad mood, agile, a bit torn (which make me believe he is a veteran) and his steel leg give him an instant badass look. He hunts a poor chimp that belongs to SOC army who runs in fear from him. Mega Bear punish him with a shoot in the leg. The chimp who is injured manages to escape his vision and lead the Bear to a trap and this episode concludes with Mega Bear shooting.

Matt Burniston and his crew did a wonderful job developing this episode and part2 already available with a new character Mega Tiger. The animation is top notch and the storytelling is quite entertaining. One thing that caught my ear is the soundtrack, it's simply epic goodness!

I would love to see more action scenes with Mega Bear like we saw with the Tiger in part 2. I want to know more about Mega Bear and his past. How did he lost one of his legs and why he is all patched up. That get me the feeling that he is fighting for years.

Thursday, June 5, 2014

This issue is filled with action from the first page till the end. The Punisher is being attacked on every direction and he can't handle every threat at the same time... Fighting with Electro, being kicked in the head by Domino and being hunted like an animal by the Howling Commandos there is no rest for Frank.

Nathan Edmondson developed a action packed story and the pace for this issue was perfect. This kind of pace should be taken as a standard to any Punisher book, of course it's almost impossible to maintain this kind of pace when you want to develop a story.

The fight with Electro was cool and the way Frank deal with his "magnetic force" was awesome, but when he is "almost" delivering some punishment to Electro he was stopped by Domino. I'm not surprised how things "ended" for Electro, in fact Domino was hired for that, but on the other way Guillermo should had other ending at least to give us some sort of "satisfaction".

It's a fact that this version of Frank is more friendly or more social than the last 2 decades but his inner monologue at some point seemed way out of character. But after what he has been through this arc and some sort of inefficiency on dealing with Electro, i could understand why he questioned why he still does what he does. Glad that in the end Frank sort all the things out.

Mitch Gerads is still giving some extra juice in this comic and every panel seems really good despite all the blueish colors were present in every panel. I loved the POV panels when Frank shoot an Howling Commando while on the top of the bus and not to mention the extraordinary explosions that Frank was caught in. Gerads has born to be the artist of the Punisher and i'm glad he is on board.

ISSUE RATING: 8 / 10

ARC RATING: 7.5 / 10

Final Note: Despite this book is doing good and well executed by Edmondson & Gerads, i would like to see more "spectacularity" from the Punisher. What i want, is to see some bad ass stunts from him instead of him behave like a "normal" operator for example like some stuff he did on issue #1. This is marvel 616, he doesn't have to behave like Punisher MAX. If the Howling Commandos have "cheat" bullets, the Punisher can have some sort of weaponry/tech that can give him some advantage.

Next issue will be reviewed by Neil Byce. I will keep my reviews on Punisher HQ, and i will be back here for Punisher #8!

Thank you Nathan, Mitch and Thomas for making the Punisher alive again!